Hey folks that are Ontario located - are you following the changes that Ford’s administration is making to Ontario Student Assistance Program (OSAP)?
As an American, I mostly got wind of this because I know a lot of university and high school students are doing walkouts tomorrow to protest the changes.
Apparently starting in September they’re removing:
the six-month interest-free grace period
and the family income threshold will be lowered, making less students qualify
Low-income students will now have to take out a loan to cover a portion of their funding, instead of just a grant
Does this affect you or your family? Did you previously get this funding for school?
Side note:
Also as an American this was mildly heartbreaking to read in comparison to our costs. Why are you so much better at things Canada?: “With tuition costing an average of $6,500 in 2017-18, not including room, board and transportation costs amounting to several thousands, students still require a large amount of financial capital to attend university.”
No. No-one can keep up with the cluster fuck provincial government, and that osap thingy was a lot of tweets/announcements /executive orders ago
Today we’re going to give every teacher in the province “a math test” and if they don’t pass, they can’t teach
(teachers are regulated by their own college and do continuing Ed and are striking in September thanks to an ongoing livestream of dumb thoughts Ford has about running education. And crushing humans in general. Ask fish dude his thoughts about the provincial government if you want to watch a human head explode)
Money related - I got osap my second time in higher Ed. It is good. The 6 month grace period was handy while waiting for months to write a test to see if I could work in my field
I think that you’re specifically referring to the magic grant that I’m too old for that pays tuition for low income students attending school for the first time. That is a newer program that I support, but which we all knew he’d scrap. Any PC would, not just the populist kind.
When you look at Canadian student loans and tuition fees, remeber that unemployment is the expectation in higher Ed here. Programs are designed to take up a good 60 hours of your week during the school year. If you’re on osap, you can only work 10 hours a week before facing claw backs.
But overall please don’t ask such triggering questions. The queen is too busy to rescue us. And the walkout is about everything. Maybe we should all walk out.
I don’t know if Ontario student aid is the same as in my province. If So, it’s supplementary to federal student aid, which is the big main program. My provincial loans are about 1/5 My federal loans. I don’t really care what happens to the provincial program, tbh. It’s the federal one that is crushing me alive.
I forget y’all have the queen. I am weirdly American smug about lack of a queen or requirements to bow to anyone. But then…umm…look what we have right now so nvm.
Oof definitely not. I just got over crying about health care for the third time this week. Ugh.
The fords don’t know what they don’t know. I mean, what kind of dealer sells moldy weed?
I think that the Ontario first student grant was an Ontario thing. Probably Kathleen Wynne, my favourite liberal politician ever. Practically ndp bless her red heart. Maybe she can be prime minister
Don’t congratulate us too much, our society is becoming more unequal as we speak.
(I’m not immediately affected by any cuts made as my kids are so young there will be a billion changes to postsecondary schooling/funding before I need to consider how it affects them. My horror is over how all the cuts and changes seem to target the vulnerable and poor. Like if you’re not rich your life doesn’t matter. I am angry at the parts of the province that voted in this government and hope those Ford voters enjoy their service cuts. The rest of us didn’t ask for or deserve this.)
